Reasons to be grateful, one to five.

I'm struggling to get back into the blogging vibe so I thought I'd make a list of things I'm grateful for this week.  A reminder of how lucky I am, if you like.

The first thing I'm thankful for is the fact that I'm still working.  I know that sounds a bit strange but let me explain... 

Last week I was doing a corporate job in one of London's grand hotels.  There were major problems with the job, (someone had misread the plans, we were running behind etc) so everyone was under pressure.  It was horrible, tempers were frayed.  By the end of the rig day, I just wanted to go and find another job.  But you know what?  Everything was ok in the end.  The job went off fine, the client was pleased and I'm happy to accept more work.  The moral of the story is - it's never as bad as it seems. 

Image via http://memegenerator.net

The second thing I'm grateful for follows on from the first.  It's my job.  It's creative, it's practical and it allows me to see sides of London, of the world which I wouldn't have under normal circumstances.  Recently, I was on a coach driving through west London, gazing out the window, as you do, and I realised that, through the years, I'd done jobs in an awful lot of places along the route, ranging from car parks to office blocks to theatres.  I'm met some fascinating people too - celebrities, remand prisoners, royalty, refugees.  The job drives me mad at times but it's a calling and I wouldn't have it any other way.

The third thing I'm thankful for is my naughty little cat.  She keeps me company, demands food when I'm trying to take important phone calls and is an ace at chasing rolled up paper balls.  I love her.  If that makes me a crazy cat lady, so be it.

Not my actual cat.  Image via http://www.bandofcats.com

 

Fourthly, we're off to Spain soon!!  I can't wait.  We're going to Seville and Valencia.  Any suggestions about things to do, places to eat, etc would be very gratefully received.

Finally, I'm bloody glad that it seems to have stopped raining!  It's nice that popping out to Sainsbury's doesn't have to feel like you're on a North Sea trawler battling the elements. 

Who was St. Valentine?

It's Valentine's Day - aw!  Cue an outpouring of red & pink heart themed products, teddy bears and slightly awkward couples in restaurants eating overpriced, mediocre meals.

It has got me thinking though - who was St. Valentine and how did he get to give his name to such a commercial day?

It turns out that no one's quite sure who The Saint Valentine actually was.

There are two Valentines who were executed and subsequently martyred on February the 14th.  The first was a Roman priest who was imprisoned for marrying Christian couples and eventually beheaded on February 14th in either 269,270 or 273.

The second Valentine was the former Bishop of Terni, (a city in what is now Umbria) who was beaten and beheaded on February 14th 269 for trying to convert the Emperor Claudius to Christianity.

Ok, but how did the anniversary of such violent deaths become linked to a day for lurve?

It turns out that our old mate, Geoffrey Chaucer had a hand in this.  In 1381 he wrote a poem called 'Parlement of Foules', (The Parliment of Birds) where Saint Valentine's Day is mentioned as the day when all the birds choose their mates for the year.

"And in a launde upon a hil of flowres

Was set this noble goddesse Nature;

Of braunches were hir halles and hir bowres,

Ywrought after hir cast and hir mesure;

Ne was ther fowl that cometh of engendrure

That they ne were alle prest in hir presence

To take hir doom, and yive hire audience.

For this was on Saint Valentines day, 

Whan every brid cometh there to chese his make"

A copy of the original poem is here and a modern translation here.

The idea of a special day devoted to love quickly caught on and before you know it, people were sending each other massive, luridly decorated, often padded cards declaring their feelings.

Image via http://www.epikardia.com/blog

There is a story that the idea of Valentine's Day, as we celebrate it today, was started by Hallmark Cards to sell cards in that lull between Christmas and Easter but it's nothing more than an urban myth.  The introduction of the Penny Post in 1680 and cheap, mass produced cards meant that people have been expressing their desires via kitsch paper products for well over two hundred years.  Hallmark Cards was only started in 1910. 

*

Personally, I'm ambivalent about Valentine's Day.  On one hand, I can't help feeling that if you need a themed meal and a cheap card to affirm your relationship, you're in trouble.  On the other hand, the romantic in me likes the idea of a day devoted to love.

Whether or not you celebrate Valentine's Day, just enjoy it and for god's sake, don't do as a friend of mine did last year - get drunk and post a series of self pitying posts on Facebook saying that no one's ever going to love you because you're too ugly.

August Bank Holiday roundup

Well, it's been and gone.  The last Bank Holiday of the year, that is. Very nice it was too.

Well, I could have done with a little less rain & a little more sun but you can't have everything.  Oh, who am I kidding?  All that rain on Saturday enabled me to sit indoors, all snug & warm & dry, looking at pictures of the mudfest that was Leeds Festival and feel very smug that I wasn't working there.  I've worked on muddy festivals for years so I feel I've earned the right to be feel pleased with myself.  The stories from friends who were working on it sounded horrific.

Anyway I'm rambling...

Friday was lovely.  We went to the BFI to see this film.  It was an odd film - a compilation of training videos from West Germany covering every aspect of life from birth to crossing the road to stripping - but there was something compelling about it.  It was a really thought provoking insight into life back then.  Was everything so controlled or does it just seem like it with hindsight?  Is that where health and safety started?  Who knows.

Afterwards we went onto Le Pain Quotidien and ate & drank far too much.  It was great.

Saturday was devoted to taking it easy & the aforementioned smugness.

On Sunday, we met up with friends in Shoreditch.  We went to a Vietnamese place on Kingsland Road (very nice) then on to an 'Alternative Burlesque Evening'.  This was probably the most disappointing part of the weekend.  It was Sunday evening, remember. Even though it was a Bank Holiday, the public transport was still Sunday service.  This means transport finishing early, so the promoters, in their wisdom decided to start the show at 10 o'clock and then of course, they were running late!  In the end, we saw one act before we had to leg it to get our trains.  Luckily the tickets were free otherwise I'd have been asking for my money back.  I know it's all 'decadent' and 'cool' to have these things late but surely the worst thing is to have your audience walking out half way through the show.  It's extremely dispiriting for the performers and frankly a waste of time even putting it on.

Shoreditch is a funny place.  I love it and hate it in equal measure. There are some fascinating, quirky bars & restaurants there but the incredibly self aware nature of the place does start to grate after a while.  The funniest person on Twitter, Mangal 2 (a kebab restaurant in Dalston incidentally!) put it very well.

Image va https://twitter.com/mangal2

I can't help feeling that the Shoreditch 'scene' is starting to eat itself. About ten years ago, a friend of mine worked for an artist's studio around there.  The reasons they rented space there, as did many other artists, were cheap rents and the area's proximity to central London. The hipsters got wind of the art scene and started moving in in their droves.  Of course, the inevitable happened, rents started going up and the artists, the creators of the scene, couldn't afford it anymore & started moving out, leaving just the hipsters.

On Sunday, my boyfriend and I decided to go out to the country to do some star gazing.  Yes, we're both nerds.  I have the Night Sky app which enables you to identify stars and other objects like satellites in the night sky (Lyra!  Arcturus!)  It was great fun and quite romantic sitting in the dark with a blanket wrapped around us looking at the stars.

And now it's Tuesday.  And I'm trying to drum up some more work. Joy.

Hurrah for summer!

Yay!  It's nearly the weekend!

I've worked very hard this summer so I've decided to give myself the rest of August off and enjoy the remainder of the (hopefully) good weather.

Image via Simon Howden of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

It's been absolute bliss not having to wake up to an alarm clock, wearing pretty girly clothes, cooking nice food and catching up with friends.

We're seeing a film at the BFI this evening and on Sunday we're going to an alternative burlesque evening in Shoreditch.

What are your plans for the weekend?  I'd love to hear them.  x

A sunny afternoon in London

My boyfriend and I decided to take advantage of the very un - English, warm, sunny weather we've been having here recently and go exploring London.

We started off at the Southbank.  It's one of my favourite places in London.  I think the mixture of highbrow sophistication (the National Theatre, the BFI cinema & the Royal Festival Hall) coupled with the street culture of the skate park & the food market gives it a unique atmosphere.

Once we'd had our fill of people watching, we boarded the river boat at the London Eye pier and off we went...

Naturally I had to take a picture of the Tower Bridge, even though I know it very well...

We disembarked at the O2 (North Greenwich Pier)

I must admit, I find the whole Greenwich peninsular a little soulless. It's just full of generic restaurants which you could find anywhere in London.  I wanted to show my boyfriend The Pilot pub which is a very old pub in the only Georgian terrace left in the area but they'd closed in order to catch up on their glass washing!!  Okaay...  We ended up in a branch of Wagamama's which was fine but completely indistinguishable from every other branch of Wagamama's I've ever been to.

After we'd finished our food we caught the cable car over the river.  

The views were fantastic

We could see the Thames Barrier

The sun actually started setting on western side of the cable car

The journey ended on the north side of the river, near the Excel Centre

I loved the birds living on the base of the cable car pylons...

... and the illustrations of local history

 

The nerd in me was fascinated by the planes coming in to land at London City Airport.  Those planes were close!

See those beige strips in the middle right of the picture?  Those are the runways for City Airport.  Yup, they're on the river.

After a brief wander around the Excel Centre, (not much to see there) we dropped in on my brother who lives near Canary Wharf. This is the view from his kitchen window.  Seriously.

After supper with him, it was getting late so we caught the tube home, tired and happy.  A great day.

Sunday afternoon

Yesterday really was wonderful.  One of those perfect days that really sets you up for the coming week.

We started off by going up to Hampstead to see 'The Stars that play with Laughing Sam's Dice' by Robert Calvert (from Hawkwind) at the Pentameters Theatre.

I knew it was going to be special the moment we walked in. Pentameters is a fringe theatre above a gastro pub in Hampstead. Audience seating was wooden chairs with a selection of mismatched, old cushions.  A joss stick was burning in the corner and the back wall was covered with pictures from previous shows.

The lights didn't just dim before the show started, the founder of Pentameters actually came on stage and chatted to us about the show.  She'd met Robert Calvert whilst she was visiting a friend in a mental home back in the 70's and had encouraged him to write this script!  It was so interesting to hear the personal aspect to the production.  She also told us a little bit about everyone involved in the production, even down to the technician.

The play was about a meeting between a young, black, American paratrooper called James Marshall Hendrix and a staff sergeant back in the 60's.  The paratrooper went on to become Jimi Hendrix.  It's very much of its time, which believe me, isn't a problem as far as I'm concerned.  There was premonitions and talk of pacifism and a bit of psychodelia.  The only problem I had was with the casting of the sergeant.  He was obviously younger than the guy playing Hendrix and that didn't really ring true with me.  Still, it was a minor quibble.

It's such a shame that yesterday was the last performance otherwise I'd be urging everyone to go and see it.

*

After the show, we decided to go for a walk as it was such a gorgeous evening.  We didn't have any particular destination in mind other than following our noses down interesting looking streets.

We ended up walking through the leafy streets of Hampstead, dreaming of living there one day,

through Swiss Cottage and into Regents Park.

We came across a flying trapeze school but sadly they weren't practising.

After dismissing the tourist trap that is Baker Street, we ended up in The Real Greek just off Marylebone High Street.  Good fresh food was the perfect end to the day.

Book review - The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton

I finished this book by one of my favourite authors, Kate Morton a couple of days ago and I can't stop thinking about it.

Image via http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Secret-Keeper-Kate-Morton/9780330477598

It begins as a fairly standard but well written family mystery novel. A young girl, Laurel, is sitting reading in a tree house on a warm summers day in 1961.  She witnesses something that afternoon which changes her life for ever.  The act that she sees is a lot more 'full on' than is usual for the genre and this was the first sign that this book was going to be different.

Action switches between 2011, the 60's and wartime London as the adult Laurel tries to uncover what actually happened that afternoon and why.  She realises that something happened to her mother, Dorothy during the war which triggered the event she witnessed as a young girl.  I must admit, I very nearly stopped reading the book because I found the character of Dorothy incredibly irritating, manipulative and self absorbed but I continued reading & I'm so glad I did.  The twist at the end of the book is shocking and completely unexpected and yet emotionally satisfying.  It subverts the conventions of the genre in a rather good way.

The Secret Keeper is a very rich, multi layered book - very much my favourite kind of read.  A definite recommendation from me. 

Visiting the Olympic Park

I'd tried and tried to get tickets for either the Olympics or Paralympics without any luck so when a friend texted me to say that he had a spare day pass ticket to the Olympic Park, I leapt at the chance.  The ticket was only £5 and didn't allow entry into any events but I did want to go, just to experience the atmosphere.

You don't realise just how big the park is when you're watching the games on TV.  We spent about six hours there just walking around, seeing the sights.

It was exciting to see the stadium up close...

...and The Orbit (designed by Anish Kapoor) Britain's largest piece of public art.

I was intrigued by the BBC's temporary studio

made from containers.

The flowers were incredible. Beautiful, vibrant wild flowers everywhere.

If you were tired of walking around, there was plenty to do.

Bands to watch

The Beat Box to explore...

...with music by Mark Ronson and Katy B

Hidden gardens to discover...

...filled with messages from well wishers and fans.

At one point we managed to get a tiny glimpse of the spectators and athletes in the stadium.  It was so thrilling and give us a glimpse of the excitement.  The roar from the crowd sent shivers of exhilaration down my spine.  One of the volunteers told us that the cheer when Usain Bolt won the 100m would stay with her for the rest of her life. 

A very good day all round.

London, women and the Olympics

Before the Olympics started, I was this Londoner - grumpy and dreading the impact it would have on our over-burdened, creaky transport system.  But I loved the games and ended up watching more sport in the last two weeks than the rest of my life put together.  I've even become an armchair expert in a number of sports which previously I was unaware of.  So what happened?

I think the change started with the Opening Ceremony.  I knew a number of people working on it, so I watched the show from start to finish.  And what fun it was!  I just adored the extravagant, joyful silliness of it all - the Industrial Revolution set in Hobbit land; tributes to the NHS AND the victims of the July 7 bombings; British music; Mr Bean and the Queen parachuting all in one show, not to mention that magnificent Olympic Flame sculpture.  I was so, so proud of all my friends on it.  I know how much hard work they'd put into it and it went off absolutely flawlessly.  Whisper - I even had a swell of patriotic pride.

London really stepped up to the mark.  The whole city really did look its best, everyone was happy and cheerful and for the most part, the transport worked well.

And then of course there're the athletes.  There's something compelling about watching human beings at the height of their abilities push themselves to the limit.  I loved Jessica Ennis's win as well as Mo Farah's runs.  Not forgetting Usain Bolt's astonishing victories.  And as for Nicola Adams - wow!  The first woman to win the first Olympic women's boxing tournament.

One of the things that's really impressed me is how generous and gracious both the winners and the losers were.  Every person has acknowledged the debt they owe to the people around them - coaches, family and friends and everyone has paid tribute to their fellow athletes.  The losers have so often apologised for letting people down which, I initially found very strange, but when I thought about it, I realised what a brave, big hearted thing to do it is.  It's about accepting the responsibility for failure fairly and squarely, without blaming anyone.  Such a contrast to the selfish, petulant, 'Me first, nothing's my fault' culture that prevails today, especially amongst overpaid footballers.

In many ways it was the women's games.  Women were competing for the first time from Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Palestine.  Women's boxing was an Olympic sport for the first time.  Finally, it really felt that women's sport, (and by association women in general) was really considered equal to men's.  A rather sexist colleague of mine, who made it clear before the games started that he regarded women's sport as nothing but something to keep the girlies happy whilst the men got on with the serious stuff, became an ardent supporter of the British Judo medallist Gemma Gibbons.  He bored everyone with the information that 'she'd won with a broken thumb, y'know' until we had to tell him to shut up.

Finally, an open plea to all editors - I'd really like to see more women like this in my magazines.  Beautiful women with strong, powerful bodies who've achieved incredible things.  Not vacuous, emaciated, media hungry idiots like the Kardashians et al who've never achieved anything worthwhile in their lives.

Jessica Ennis, Olympic gold medallist in the women's heptathlon.

Image via http://elizabethswardrobe.tumblr.com

Victoria Pendleton, Olympic gold medallist in the women's keirin.

Image via http://fashioneditoratlarge.blogspot.co.uk

Nicola Adams, Olympic Gold medallist in the first Olympic women's boxing tournament.

Image via http://www.examiner.co.uk

Jubilee weekend in London

The Jubilee weekend is here.  

I was initially indifferent to it but I must admit, I'm now rather looking forward to it.  The flags, bunting and general air of excitement is infectious.

It was rather touching today to see ordinary people displaying uncharacteristic patriotism - the shelf stacker in the supermarket with a huge Union Jack flag over his shoulders; the phalanxes of school children proudly displaying the crowns/flags/pictures of the Queen that they'd made in school as they walked down the street; the street next to me with bunting strung the entire length.

I will be working on an event taking place on one of the boats taking place in the Jubilee Boat Parade but I'm contractually obliged not to talk about it.  Suffice to say, I do hope the weather holds out.

Once the parade is over, I plan to spend the rest of the weekend attending street parties and relaxing.

I hope your weekend is fun, wherever you are.  x

Neals Yard London

When I'm working in Covent Garden I love finding bolt holes where I can go and relax far from the craziness.  Neals Yard is one of those places.

I think it's the contrast between the old buildings and the hippy vibe that I find so appealing.  

Phew!

It's been very busy since New Year.  I've been working but most exciting of all, my wonderful boyfriend is moving in with me so we've been moving his stuff, etc.

On the down side it means that I haven't had much time for blogging.

I'll leave you with this picture I took in St. James's Park last summer...

The Great South London Christmas Tree Hunt

I think we all have a picture in our heads of how the perfect Christmas should be.  I know I do.

A couple of days ago, I decided that my lodger, my boyfriend and myself would spend an evening decorating our Christmas tree.  I had a vague scene playing in my head with the three of us sipping Gluhwein/Baileys, nibbling on mince pies with festive music playing softly in the background and regaling heart warming & amusing Christmas related stories from our pasts whilst placing the decorations on the tree in an aesthetically pleasing manner.

Well, the Christmas music was located on my iPod and the Baileys & mince pies were duly bought so all that remained was to get the Christmas tree.  My living room's not very big so I needed a Christmas tree that could sit on the table and allow us to use the table at the same time.  A tree that was no more than 2 foot high.  Last year we managed to get one without any problem.

We started off at the smaller branch of Sainsburys near the flat - only big trees. Waitrose - again the trees were too big.  Lidl - nothing. We looked in the markets/florists/street sellers nearby - all their trees were enormous.

I was still confident at this point that we'd find one pretty quickly. It's about a mile's walk to the next tube station with lots of shops along the way and I was positive that we'd find one somewhere along that road.  Rapidly it became clear that we weren't to have any luck and I started to panic silently.  My lodger was relying to us to find a tree to decorate!  Of course she wouldn't have minded at all if we'd gone home and told her we'd have to do it another day because we couldn't find a tree but I'd succumbed to the traditional pressure to Have a Perfect Christmas.

Mentally I started to consider alternatives.

A plastic palm tree!  Why not, Jesus was from the Middle East after all so it'd be more ya' know, authentic!  I'm sure my Christmas decorations would look fine on it.

A vaguely Islamic looking sculpture!  Yay for multiculturism!

A yucca plant!  Hey, I'm an alternative kinda gal!

Buy a huge Christmas tree, re-arrange the living room and store the furniture in the bedroom!  Sounds fine!  Gotta have Christmas spirit!

Tape a Magic Tree air freshener to a stick!  At least the living room'd smell nice!

By the time we reached the big Sainsburys near the next tube station, I was ready to try anything.  They were selling fir branches & my boyfriend suggested taping two branches together to create a kind of cloven hooved, two trunk tree, then putting it in a flower pot with loads of soil.  I wasn't quite desperate enough yet to have a dual trunk tree but I certainly put it on the short list.  Then I found a little 6 inch high tree.  It was the sort of thing that office workers would put on their computers but frankly, as far as I was concerned it was The Answer.  Slightly short but it was a Christmas tree nonetheless!  Luckily my boyfriend convinced me that my 2 inch high Christmas angel would just crush it.  He was right of course.

But we still had no tree.

We started off back home and I must admit I was staring wild eyed down all the side streets hoping to see a hitherto undiscovered market stall specialising in small Christmas trees.

You've guessed it.  There was nothing.  What was it about south London and their enormous living rooms with gigantic Christmas trees?

We were nearly home when I spotted a newsagents selling small plastic Christmas trees and I nearly cried with relief.  So I bought myself a slightly rusted tree-like structure covered in green plastic 'leaves'.  Christmas was saved!

Ladies and gentlemen, without any further ado, here it is...  our bent, rusty, plastic Christmas tree!  It's not perfect but it's ours and we had a great time decorating it in spite of everything.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't stress too much over the details.  Just relax and enjoy the time with your loved ones.  That's far more important than perfection.  

Happy Christmas everyone! xxx

Something to make you smile - Jesus Christ in Richmond Park

I'm not a great fan of re-posting other people's stuff but this was far too funny not to share...

That poor man.  Tee hee!

Forgotten London - Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association

One of the many things I love about living in London is finding the abandoned relics of a bygone age standing forgotten and un-noticed in the urban landscape.

This is just outside Clapham Common tube station.

A quick internet search reveals that, during the 19th century, clean safe free drinking water for all was very scare.  The Metropolitan Free Drinking Fountain was set up in 1859 to provide free drinking water for London's general populace.  The foundation set up drinking fountains and troughs like this all over London which immediately became not only very popular but vital for a healthy population.  As the infrastructure increased and drinking water became available inside the home, these fountains fell into disuse.

As for me, I wish there were still horses and cattle in London to stop and take a long cool drink at troughs like these.

A lazy Sunday on the Southbank.

The weather has been topsy turvy recently so I was very glad that I'd booked tickets for a talk today with Victor Gregg, hosted by Rick Stroud.

Victor Gregg is a 92 year old ordinary Londoner who just happens to have led a most extraordinary life.  He joined the British Army at the age of 19 and was present at the Battle of El Alamein.  Victor volunteered for the Parachute Regiment after his experiences in north Africa.  After landing in eastern Germany, he was captured by the Nazis.  During his time as a prisoner of war, he was sent to Dresden.  Whilst he was in Dresden, the city was carpeted bombed by the British and Americans, (something which is now widely considered to be a war crime).  This event, in his own words, 'ruined his life for the next forty years' because nothing he'd experienced in the theatre of war prepared him for the horrors which he saw during this event.  He became a pacifist as a result and ultimately joined the Communist Party.

After the war he became a painter and decorator and ironically helped to build the Southbank Centre where today's talk was held.  Becoming tired of this he got a job as a driver for the head of a large Soviet bank in London.  This was of course, during the Cold War, and he was approached by British military intelligence to become an agent which he did.  He was a keen motor cyclist & attended many motor cycle rallies behind the Iron Curtain.  It was during one of these rallies that he accidentally bumped into the German officer who'd arrested him in eastern Germany and they became friends.  He spent a lot of time in Hungary and became one of the first people to physically cut the barbed wire that served as the Iron Curtain.

Phew!  Did you get all that?

He was a likeable old man with a very salty, particularly London turn of phrase that I found very endearing - describing the operation that ultimately lead to his capture as a prisoner of war, 'It was a cock up.  A complete balls up.  Them officers didn't know what the b****y hell they were doing.'

By the time the talk had ended, the weather had taken a turn for the better so I decided to take a wander along the Southbank.  Monstrous concrete architecture aside, it's one of my favourite parts of London.

I love the weekend book market underneath the railway arches.

I once found a 1902 edition of Thomas de Quincy's 'Confessions of an English Opium Eater' there for £10.

And then there's the graffitied arches below the Southbank where skateboarders gather to show off their skills...

I tried very hard to capture the boarders in motion but they were just too fast for me.

I was surprised and bemused by the graffiti artists' unexpected social statements...

There was a food market on. 

It's safe to say that I'm addicted to food markets.  

I had a wonderful hog roast and apple sauce sandwich followed by the most delicious chocolate brownie I have ever had.  Sitting in the sun eating good food makes me very happy.

It really was a perfect day.  What's your ideal way to spend a Sunday?